Skid Row, Lynch Mob, Exxplorer, Arch Demon – NJ

REVIEW BY: HEATHER PENFIELD MACNEILL | PHOTOGRAPHS BY: NADINE SWIGER

There are not many hard rock concerts that you can attend where you feel both immersed in powerful feelings of nostalgia, and at the same time feel the raw electricity of new energy, but Skid Row’s concert at the Starland Ballroom in Sayreville New Jersey this past Friday had just that rare synergistic balance. The band totally killed with all of the old favorites like “18 and Life” and “Youth Gone Wild,” and it had all of the in-your-face grit and passion people have come to remember and love from Skid Row. But while their amazing sound totally brings you back in time, this feels like the Skid Row of a new generation as you never get the feeling that Skid Row is a band that is stuck in past. With all of the band’s years on the stage Skid Row’s entire set felt so tight and so strong, but at the same time their delivery was inspired and new, like a glimpse of the past with all the force of the present. These guys can obviously still bring it, and for nearly two hours Skid Row raged with a non-stop, face melting intensity. And this tour is far from over! Skid Row is going to be continuing their rampage across the US throughout the summer so you had better get on over to www.skidrow.com for the latest list of tour dates! The band has started recording and has promised that new music will be coming our way soon; keep with the band and all their news at the site. You’ve loved Skid Row, and now your kids are going to love them too! Don’t miss this rebirth of the band you’ve loved and remembered for all these years!

Preceeding Skid Row to the stage was Lynch Mob, with George Lynch delivering the virtuoso performance everyone has pretty much come to expect as a given for this man. These blues-metal vets have been on the scene for many years, and the control and mastery of the music was evident. You got the feeling Lynch Mob are such pros they could pull off a show in their sleep if they had to and it would still sound better than 90% of the bands out there today. The audience certainly responded to the performance; the energy in the Starland had been building for quite some time but it wasn’t until Lynch Mob took the stage that people really began rocking out. By the time they reached their finale even the youngins in the crowd who know nothing of Lynch’s guitar superstar reputation were cheering, and those kiddies with their adolescent cynicism can be the hardest to impress! Lynch Mob will be continuing on to some tour dates in South America if you feel like getting a bit of sun with shows in Mexico, El Salvador , and Costa Rica, among others, and then they’ll be back up to the US for more summer tour dates. Check out www.georgelynch.com for tour dates, or find them on Facebook at www.facebook.com/georgelynchfanpage.

Skid Row and Lynch Mob weren’t the only metal bands rocking the Starland that night! Even before they hit the stage power metal band Exxplorer were tearing up the stage. Originally formed in New Jersey back in the 80s, the band reunited in 2009 and performed at the True Metal Fest in Germany. The success of this performance brought them to Europe for many more performances and they have since released a new album “Vengeance Rides an Angry Horse” on Pure Steel Records. They will be returning to Europe again shortly, but not before multiple performance dates across the US. More is obviously on the horizon for this band and you can follow them at www.Exxplorer.net or https://www.facebook.com/pages/ExxplorerMusicianBand/194170540597224.

If you thought an evening of such face melting metal was going to go by without any raging female performers you were mistaken! The NYC/Northern New Jersey band Arch Demon set the stage on fire with the fierce Dayna Jade commanding the attention of that audience and holding it in the palm of her hand- no easy feat to manage so early on in the evening! With her powerful vocals ringing throughout the house you could see her grabbing the focus of everyone in the Starland, and Arch Demon’s metal was just as dark and as dirty as the name would suggest. A strong beginning for such a night of classic metal. To get the latest information on their upcoming shows check out www.archdemonmetal.com or www.daynajade.com .